Visionary Project: Food Provision through Sustainable Farming Systems and Value Chains

Aberdeen University is taking part in the EU horizon and UKRI-funded Visionary project on ‘Food provision through sustainable farming systems and value chains’, aiming to improve the sustainability of agriculture by promoting those practices in food production systems that are more environmentally friendly, economically viable, and socio-culturally appropriate, and helping to remove the barriers to their adoption. The project will consider necessary changes in both, policy and business models. Several other countries are involved also including Germany, Hungary, Poland, Denmark and Spain.
 
SOPAs involvement in the project so far has been to be involved in an organic food and farming science policy workshop together with other stakeholders which highlighted several needs / recommendations for Scotland including:

• the need for government support and policy change – inc. an organic action plan;
• improvements on the value and supply chain – abattoirs, butchers, organic inputs and processors; 
• organic market development – accessible and affordable organic food, the importance of public procurement.

The next steps for the project are to have one to one interviews with stakeholders, to hold science policy workshops each year of the project and to hold 3 webinars in April and May to focus on practical ways to facilitate the transition towards sustainability in food systems.

If you would like further information on this project please visit the Visionary website here or contact SOPA's Policy Lead Jo Barron (jo.barron@sopa.org.uk).